Both nominations and finalists are voted for by members of the World Science Fiction Society, who pay $40 (£27.59) annual membership. It’s a two-stage process. Members vote for up to five favourites in each category: the most popular of these make up the official nominees.

Each of the members then rank the nominees in order of preference. The winning entry has the greatest total support. There is also the option to select “No Vote” against all nominees, which can see no award given if enough members select this option.

The controversy

Members of the sci-fi and fantasy community have been arguing about the make-up of this year’s Hugo nominations on two accounts: the race and gender of the authors nominated and the subject of their work, and the extent to which their work fits into the sci-fi and fantasy genres.

People have been posting their opinions in blog posts and on social media.

Planned to vote for the Hugo Awards for the first time this year. Wasn't expecting that No Award will be so important for my voting.

They say that their list contains: “entirely deserving works, writers, and editors — all of whom would not otherwise find themselves on the Hugo ballot without some extra oomph received from beyond the rarefied, insular halls of 21st century Worldcon ‘fandom’.”

Brad R Torgersen and Larry Correia are members of the Sad Puppies who put forward the list, or slate.

Torgersen also complained that Hugo voters were becoming “an affirmative action award: giving Hugos because a writer or artist is (insert underrepresented minority or victim group here) or because a given work features (insert underrepresented minority or victim group here) characters."

When the nominations were announced on April 4, Correia posted: "This is just one little battle in an ongoing culture war between artistic free expression and puritanical bullies who think they represent *real* fandom. In the long term I want writers to be free to write whatever they want without fear of social justice witch hunts, I want creators to not have to worry about silencing themselves to appease the perpetually outraged."

But other members of the community have disagreed with Sad Puppies’ stance and attempt to lobby voting members.

Some writers have withdrawn from being included on their slate, such as Dave Creek, author of novella The Jenregar and the Light, who posted on Facebook: "being linked to Larry Correia makes me uncomfortable."

Author and previous Hugo winner John Scalzihas encouraged members to use the No Vote, saying that he will leave nominees off his final ballot or use No Award for nominees that don't "merit being on the ballot".